


waterlogged and riddled with bullets

by Intangible_Insanity



Series: Remembrance [2]
Category: Hetalia: Axis Powers
Genre: Gen, Horses, Remembrance Day, Swearing, War is hell, World War I
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-11
Updated: 2017-11-11
Packaged: 2019-02-01 00:02:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 501
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12692895
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Intangible_Insanity/pseuds/Intangible_Insanity
Summary: Shapes, maybe equipment or horses or Germans or allies alike, lie quietly all around where the broken shorn-down remnants of trees jab accusingly at the overcast sky. He’s forgetting why they are fighting.





	waterlogged and riddled with bullets

**Author's Note:**

> Cross-posted on FF.net.

It was a pitiful sight that made his already pulpy bruised heart ache even more.

The taut stretch of moiled fur over visible expansive ribs, the careless jumbled strew of gangly legs half sunk into the quagmire, the mud-plastered bridle and pack still strapped on with no owner in sight—the horse, like many others of its species and soldiers alike, was going to die in this stupid muddy hellhole.

Canada, himself, had just been dragged up from the wretched squelching grip of the unabating bog by the sheer frenzied efforts of Australia to recover him before he drowned, again. Coughing until he could scarcely breathe without the taste of dirt in his mouth, he lay on one of those narrow duckboards that were supposed to allow them to cross the gaping muddy craters that was the battlefield. Australia flopped gracelessly beside him and was equally muddy and wet, sucking deep breaths that stirred the numbing layer of silt rapidly cooling on their bared skin. And the horse—it was just there within eyesight when his head lolled to the side, lying exhausted and waterlogged and riddled with bullets, and just a little further was another pair harnessed together, their heavy cargo abandoned and were steadily sinking into the mire.

As much as his body ached, he inched until his fingertips could just barely brush the once snowy blaze of the horse’s snout. He tried hushed it in an attempt to mollify its gurgly huffing and flashing whites of those huge round eyes.

He is so damn glad he did not let Kuma accompany him here.

The little bear would whine and paw at him all he wanted but he was resolute. God knows why he would want to be anywhere near here. He would’ve ended up like this horse. He realizes then that while Kuma could choose, this horse most likely does not know why it is here, for what purpose. Only to be shot at and dragged through hell on earth and then fucking abandoned.

Casting an eye all around him, only mud and mud and more fucking mud and water like they didn’t already have enough at the trenches. Shapes, maybe equipment or horses or Germans or allies alike, lie quietly all around where the broken shorn-down remnants of trees jab accusingly at the overcast sky. He’s forgetting why they are fighting for these few kilometres of fucking hellscape only to die not because of enemy fire but because the battlefield itself was trying to kill them all. They have achieved nothing, nothing at all except die.

The futility creeps up on him until he is submerged and gasping, and he cries, desperately wishing to comfort the pitiful horse and being unable to.

Hands clutch tight onto his soaked uniform, startlingly hot against his chilled flesh as Australia becomes a welcome grounding weight against him. Sounding so tired, Australia mutters into his neck as he only sobs harder, “I hate this too, Matt, I hate this so much.”

**Author's Note:**

> Been out of this fandom for a long time now but wrote this as a part of something that was for the 150 celebration but I have not finished it and will probably not finish...so sharing one of the better parts here.
> 
> Probably not historically accurate but...the image of dying horses while serving throughout WWI was really striking for me. 'They didn't have a choice' (along with other animals) and that really stuck with me. Then there's Passchendaele. The centennial of it ending was yesterday I believe? The legacy that it left behind really epitomized the war for me.
> 
> Lest we forget — Je me souviens


End file.
